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Science & Tech
Explore the discoveries that reveal how the world works, alongside the technologies that extend, reshape, and sometimes challenge what’s possible.
The anthropic principle has some fascinating scientific uses. And abuses, too. For thousands of years, humans have pondered the meaning of our existence. From philosophers who debated whether their minds could […]
The Twin Jet nebula, shown here, is a stunning example of a bipolar preplanetary nebula. At the center, a dying star is in the final stages of life where it […]
We just found a system that we can’t explain. Here’s what’s going on. One of the most fascinating facts about the Universe is that there’s so much of it out there. […]
If we waited long enough, would even protons themselves decay? There are certain things in the Universe that, if you leave them alone for long enough, they’ll eventually decay away. […]
Telescopes from the ground are bigger, but have to fight the atmosphere. Here’s how to win. In astronomy, seeing farther and fainter than ever before requires three simultaneous approaches. First light, […]
It wasn’t the birth of space and time. But it was truly essential to our cosmic story. For more than 50 years, we’ve had definitive scientific evidence that our Universe, as […]
California’s Bobcat Fire has reached Mount Wilson Observatory’s doorstep. 100 years ago, our understanding of the Universe was very different from what it is today. Einstein’s General Relativity, our theory […]
It will take a national effort to get it done. Here’s how. Over the past six months — a full half of a year — the United States has suffered more deaths and illnesses due […]
Have any of the stars we can see burned themselves out completely? When we look out across the Universe, we’re also peering back in time. In the early 21st-century, we’ve […]
Black holes are the darkest objects of all. But are they made of dark matter? When it comes to the Universe, few objects are more compelling, fascinating, or extreme than black […]
Forgetting them, at any step, can lead to unscientific conclusions. No one, not even the smartest among us, were competent scientists from the outset. The concept of science is simple […]
The view is different for each of us, but this perspective unites us all. From anywhere on Earth, the entire sky rotates a full 360° every 24 hours. From Earth, star […]
NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope will truly usher in a new era of astronomy. If you want to find the very first galaxy of all, you have to understand not […]
The pendulum didn’t tick right when they brought it here: the start of a fascinating story. For nearly three full centuries, the most accurate way that humanity kept track of […]
Without a little help from Einstein, we couldn’t have made this discovery. NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope, currently celebrating its 30th anniversary, still churns out novel discoveries. The Hubble eXtreme Deep […]
The view from beyond Pluto is far enough from Earth that we can see the stars shift. NASA’s New Horizons, humanity’s first spacecraft to encounter Pluto, is more than 4.3 billion […]
Solid, liquid, and gas are the three everyone learns. Plasma is the fourth. But there are two more, and they’re fascinating. How many states of matter are there? When you […]
We’re looking back farther in time than ever before. Here’s what we’re finding. Even today, the Universe is forming enormous numbers of new stars: from various nebulae throughout our galaxy to […]
It happened 13.8 billion years ago, so why hasn’t the radiation all passed over us by now? For the past 13.8 billion years, our Universe has been expanding, cooling, and gravitating. […]
The origin of the 3rd element on the periodic table was one of the great cosmic mysteries. We just solved it. How did we form the elements that pervade the Universe […]